The Judas Complex
by prouvaires
Summary: -I won't be the Christ to your Judas.- ArthurMorgana


**Rating: **T(een).

**Pairing: **ArthurMorgana

**A/N: **I tried to make it a tragedy. I really did. But Morgana just wouldn't have it.

**--**

They corner her eventually. It was only a matter of time, after all. The spell Merlin placed on her to sap her strength and her magic slows her down, her body drooping listlessly on her white mare, her red cloak a blaze of colour against the lifeless landscape.

She gives in finally on a stand of trees on a slight rise. She draws her curved sword from its sheath and dismounts from her horse, puffs of air rising in front of them both on the frosty morning breeze.

"Morgana," the voice comes from behind her, and she turns to see Arthur striding towards her. The golden crown of his kingship is absent from his brow, and she grips her sword tighter in her right hand.

"I will not surrender," she tells him tightly, her eyes burning with intentions as he halts several paces from her. "You will not imprison me."

"You were never made to be imprisoned," he replies softly, and she shifts minutely closer to her horse as her fatigue-impaired muscles protest weakly at the weight of the blade in her hand.

"Then what was I made for?" she challenges abrasively, straightening her spine and lifting her chin and staring him down. "Was I made to be a pretty, spoiled princess who let innocent people die because she liked her dresses and status too much? Or was I made to be hunted for all my life?"

"I wish …" he begins, but trails off and sighs furiously at himself.

"_I wish_ what?" she mocks, her brows drawing in confusion as he sticks his sword point-down in the wet earth and presses his face into his hands.

"You have killed so many people, Morgana," he murmurs, his eyes catching hers and holding them until she glances down, her face slowly starting to burn with shame.

"If you did not insist upon standing against me they would not have had to die."

"Do not turn this around on me," he retorts angrily. "You would have killed them anyway. You have lost any goodness you once had."

She gives him a slight smile because it sounds more like he's trying to persuade himself than her.

"Your father drove it from me."

His eyes shift around wildly as he agonises, and she waits patiently for him to come to a decision. She knows he will choose to kill her. Everyone always does. She learnt the hard way that even your best friend will kill you if he believes it is for the Greater Good. Whatever that is. And when this unsure kingling she knows better than anyone decides to kill her she will meet him blow for blow and make him feel the pain she has been living with for too many years now.

"I'm so sorry," he whispers, and suddenly covers the ground between them. She only has her sword half-raised before his mouth is on hers, kissing her as though his life depends upon it.

Her sword falls to the ground, making no sound against the mud and grass. She wraps her arms around his neck and her lips move against his and she's crying because she's been needing this all her life without realising.

And then, without warning, she gasps in shock and agony and looks down to see his dagger buried in her chest, her blood spilling around it as the tears course down his cheeks.

"You …" she chokes out, meaning to lash out but finding her limbs unable to obey her.

"I love you," he tells her, clutching her to his chest, peppering her hair with kisses. "If there was any other way I'd take it. Any way at all. I swear on everything that is dear to me, Morgana. I'm so sorry. I love you."

She sees Merlin in the trees mouth a spell and feels, as her life fades, the end of the spell that he placed to block her magic. With another starburst of pain she wrenches the dagger from her chest, a line of blood making a track from the corner of her mouth.

"What …" Arthur begins as her lips chant the words to the half-remembered spell, the gaping wound in her chest gradually healing itself in front of his wondering eyes. Too late, Merlin realises his mistake and hastens to replace the spell.

She is already gone, the mare with her, vanished in a black whirlwind.

"_There is always another way_," her voice whispers into Arthur's ear. "_I will not play the Christ to your Judas._"

"I don't believe in Jesus," he replies, but she really is disappeared now. With tears on his face he rises to his feet, her blood staining the front of his tunic.

"I love you," he calls to the empty air. A warm breeze scented like pine and honey and shunshine plays around him, full of betrayal and unsurety and what might possibly be tenderness.

"She will not forgive this," Merlin warns him as they walk slowly back to their horses and guards. Arthur doesn't reply, just wraps himself in a taciturn silence. He hates how Merlin finds it so easy to accept the sacrifices he must make. Arthur is not good at giving up what he loves – he has only had to do it once before.

"Stop hunting her," he orders suddenly, his hands clutching at the horse's reins as they set back out for Camelot. "Leave her alone. She has earned the right to live."

As the guards mumble in annoyance and Merlin begins to remind him how unwise that would be, the sunshine-honey-pine breeze returns and Arthur smiles as it tousles his hair, the horse beneath him stretching out into a gallop.

"_I love you, Judas,_" her voice whispers on the wind, and he breaks out into a broad grin as he feels a feather-light kiss on his cheek. "_Be safe_."

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**A/N: **Loved it, hated it, cried at it, jeered at it … let me know. Reviews are love.

Please don't favourite without reviewing, thanks!


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